Headquarters
Alveena Malik
Co-Founder & Director, One Million Mentors
Former CEO of UpRising with 15 years experience of working, at a senior level, on equalities and cohesion issues as well as delivering social innovation projects.
Previously, Alveena was Principal Associate at the Institute for Community Cohesion (iCoCo) with lead responsibility on Education and Cohesion Policy and Intercultural Dialogue. She liaised with national/local government and schools on the role that education can play in bridging cultures, strengthening active citizenship and promoting community cohesion.
Alveena was also Head of Communities and Integration Policy at the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) where she led the development of CRE policy on issues of Migration, Segregation, Extremism, Interfaith Dialogue and Conflict Resolution and Mediation.
Alveena was appointed as Special Advisor to the Communities and Local Government Committee on Migration and PREVENT. In 2010 she was appointed as Faith Panel Advisor to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government. She was also an Advisor to the Law Society’s Equality and Diversity Committee.
Tufael Ahmed
Head of Technology and Finance
Tufael was formerly Project Director of a private equity company, where he was responsible for the strategic planning of resources, systems, processes and procedures for each of the group’s companies. He was also a key advisor to the board of directors, providing strategic input on operational decisions as well as technology-focussed potential investments.
Previously, Tufael has been involved in technology for over 20 years, having co-owned and built two technology companies, one in solutions and the other in software. He shared responsibility for building them from the ground up and is well suited to providing advice to startups and growing businesses.
Tufael now works as a freelance consultant to SMEs who require support on business strategy and operational activities, in particular organisations that have a critical technological element. He is also passionate about local communities and their engagement with civil society. He contributes to a number of community-based organisations in his spare time.
Sue Belgrave
Mentor and Organisation Development Lead
Sue worked in health care, community development and television before joining The Body Shop International where she became the uniquely titled General Manager for Company Culture, an organization development role. In that role Sue was responsible for ensuring that the experience of those who worked for the company and therefore the culture, was aligned with The Body Shop’s high profile external image. Her department covered employee wellbeing, volunteering, celebrations and managing change. Having held internal responsibility for organisation development, Sue then went on to consult on OD and to set up “Hot Brushes “a business specializing in using the visual arts in organisations.
Sue then joined Roffey Park where she was the Director for the Organisational Development Practionner Programme for six years. Creating the environment in which voices can be heard has been central to Sue’s work; she is a qualified coach, mentor and facilitator, has run more than 100 large group interventions across all business sectors and specializes in participative ways of working. Sue has run her own consultancy business for the last six years, finding delight in, working in Asia where she is an advisor to the Civil Service College and in the UK supporting the introduction of Buurtzorg a Netherlands based healthcare model. Sue is an active supporter of Freedom from Torture and the creator of the Living Advent Calendar for them.
Zahid Howladar
Delivery Team Manager
Zahid’s professional background includes nearly 10 years at companies such as Cap Gemini E&Y, Morgan Stanley, and J.P. Morgan. Primarily in financial control, Zahid’s strong deliverables saw him quickly selected for JP Morgan’s Management Development program.
Since completing an MBA in 2010, Zahid keenly engages in social impact initiatives and startups. He first managed the Dubai arm of an inaugural global CSR initiative, which today is known as The Hult Prize and partnered with the Clinton Global Initiative. Hult IBS was a fledgling business school at the time, for which Zahid was Founder and Global Lead of its largest student initiative. For 5 years, he independently grew the leadership to serve 3,000+ across 5 international cities. Just one of its many unique achievements is the raising of what remains a school-record $35,000 for charity.
Most recently Zahid was a Business Development Consultant for a startup working closely with charities globally to explore feasibility of providing specific dietary requirements. Successful projects have been implemented in Bangladesh, Rohingya, Syria, and soon in Yemen.
Judith McKinney
Executive Assistant to the Director
Extensive experience in project management, administration and events management for an international NGO and several charities in the UK with a focus on young people and employability.
Judith worked at City Gateway, an East London Charity and Alternative Provision Free School that offers training for young people and women, starts social enterprises to serve the local community and builds partnerships with a wide range of firms and community organisations to help people into employment. Judith joined City Gateway in 2010 as Personal Assistant to the CEO, moving roles to Senior Executive Administrator in 2013 where she led a team of Personal and Executive Assistants, as well as supporting the Senior Executive Team and Governance. As part of her time at City Gateway, Judith supported the CEO and Senior Executive Team through the Ladder for London Campaign in conjunction with the Evening Standard newspaper, the goal of which was to create 1000 new apprenticeship placements.
More recently Judith coordinated The Young Foundation’s “MY100 Conference” in November 2015 and formed an integral part of the event team leading on UpRising’s national fundraiser in February 2016.
Judith has a passion for languages, in which she obtained a BA degree from Queen’s University of Belfast. Her love of languages and further studies in European Business Administration led her to work in Spain for 10 years as Personal Assistant to the International Director of an NGO, World Horizons International.
Greater Manchester
Lisa Murgatroyd
Regional Manager for Greater Manchester
Lisa joins the team from the role of Business Manager at coworking growth hub Accelerate Places, where she has forged an extensive network and expertise in supporting businesses. Lisa launched the space in Manchester, quickly building a community of over 35 businesses and establishing the brand within a burgeoning flexible office scene. Developing initiatives and programmes to support the entrepreneurs and start-up founders, Lisa worked closely to understand the challenges facing businesses across the creative, tech and digital space across the North West.
Following her studies of the Middle East at the University of Manchester, where she developed the faculty’s first peer to peer mentoring scheme, Lisa was employed in Marketing and Business Development for an event technology start-up. Additional strengths include events management and production, and community engagement.
With a personal passion for mentoring, Lisa has previous experience working with young people as part of the RECLAIM Project in Manchester, and also serves as a business mentor for Tech Manchester.
Isobel Finlay
Project Co-ordinator for Greater Manchester
With a history of working to improve the rights and opportunities of refugees and asylum seekers in the UK Isobel has strong skills in project management, campaigns and event organisation.
During her time studying Neuroscience at the University of Bristol, Isobel worked closely with Student Action for Refugees (STAR). As Bristol STAR President Isobel was responsible for the for the recruitment and management of volunteers and encouraging attendance of local refugees and asylum seekers to the three STAR volunteering projects. Working closely with external partners Isobel designed and delivered training to each volunteer, including safeguarding training and project inductions.
In a previous role as Bristol STAR Equal Access Coordinator, Isobel worked with representatives from the University of Bristol, local politicians and similar refugee organisations in Bristol to campaign for and develop a scholarship scheme for asylum seekers to attend the University. Equal Access is a campaign to ensure that people in the UK seeking refugee protection have equal access to higher education and can join university as equals. This work came to fruition when in June 2016 the Sanctuary Scholarship scheme was announced, offering 10 scholarships for those coming from refugee and asylum seeking backgrounds.
Isobel previously worked for RB as an Archive Assistant and is currently a Child.org Charity Fast-Tracker
West Midlands
Katie Hilder
Regional Manager for West Midlands
Katie has led volunteer-led youth programmes within the charity and non-profit sector, striving to create opportunities where young people can realize their potential. Her work has included leading the STEM Ambassador programme for Coventry, Warwickshire and Solihull, where she recruited, trained and motivated industry professionals to inspire young people to pursue careers in STEM subjects, as well as three years at The ATE Trust where she organised, promoted and delivered a multi-site programme of summer camps for 400 children annually as well as a programme of term-time residential holidays, events and training courses. As board member (non-executive director) for The
Wild Network (2014-16), she was a trusted advisor to the CEO, where she supported the development and implementation of the long-term strategy and reviewed its performance.
A keen volunteer herself, she has volunteered with The ATE Trust for over 10 years, delivering and their summer camp holidays and running training courses. She also speaks Italian and Spanish, and formerly worked professionally as a translator.
Sandra Tilley, MBE
Training and Safeguarding Lead in West Midlands
Sandra has spent most of her career in the public sector where she gained
extensive experience of working collaboratively on issues such as safeguarding
children, community cohesion and human trafficking. In July 2012 Sandra was
validated by Oxford Brookes University as an internal coach for Civil Service
Learning. After working as a coach and mentor across several Government
Departments, Sandra has since used these skills as a volunteer progression
mentor with the Prince’s Trust. Here she experienced at first hand the positive
difference mentoring can make to the lives of young people.
Sandra was awarded an MBE in 2009 for her contribution to multi-agency
collaboration in the implementation of the Government’s Safeguarding Children
strategy.
James Walker
Project Coordinator
Having campaigned for causes before, James firmly believes that equality of opportunity benefits society as a whole. He hopes his work at 1MM will contribute towards this lifelong aim.
Opting to work for a youth charity alongside his studies, James was part of a small team that organised and delivered a sell-out event that celebrated multiculturalism and heritage in the Black Country.
James holds an honours degree in Ancient History from the University of Birmingham, and especially appreciates how lessons learned from the past can be applied to the 21st century. He values idiosyncrasy, intellectualism and kindness and enjoys embracing his inner introvert on walks with his dog, Nellie.
Cardiff
Aisha Ali
Cardiff Expansion Lead
Aisha is a qualified urban planner. With over a decade of work experience in Regeneration and Planning for three large local authorities including Birmingham, Westminster and Cardiff City Council. She has a passion for progressive regeneration and the positive impact it can have on the quality of living and work environments. She has extensive experience and knowledge of working and engaging with communities from diverse backgrounds in delivering action plans aimed to improve physical and social and economic change in cities.
Aisha set up her own planning consultancy three years ago and works as a freelance urban planner mainly in the private sector. She was recently appointed as the lead planning consultant for Cardiff University’s Community Gateway Project, which seeks to use a comprehensive approach in improving areas by working in partnership with local communities.
She has recently started teaching MA Urban Design at Cardiff University where she is able to share her knowledge of urban planning gained by working both in the private and public sector. Teaching at the university has given her a great understanding to the challenges faced by young people today.